


Speed Your Love To Me

by QAtheAuthoress74



Series: Charbee Week Prompts [2]
Category: Transformers - All Media Types, Transformers - Bumblebee (2018), Transformers Animated (2007)
Genre: Bee and Sari both being the irresponsible sibling, Bumblebee is a dork, Charbee Week, Charlie Is The Cool Big Sis In This, Charlie is kinda a dork in this, F/M, I don’t know how science really works, Loose TFA Continuity, Only 1 Tutor-bot was harmed during the making of this fanfic, Please don’t splice people and animal DNA, The AllSpark Key Can DO Anything, The other Autobots don’t appear until the end. Sorry Prowl fans
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-15
Updated: 2020-12-15
Packaged: 2021-03-10 17:07:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,486
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28090644
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QAtheAuthoress74/pseuds/QAtheAuthoress74
Summary: Bumblebee didn’t understand why Prof. Sumdac thought Sari needed a HUMAN babysitter. Sure the mini-bot and human tended to get in more trouble (and get attacked by villains) when they were alone, but that was beside the point! He would be way cooler than some mechanic name Charlie from California. What did that guy had that he didn’t?~~‘Wait, that’s not a boy human.’ the black and yellow Autobot thought as he took one long stare at the brown haired, brown eyed human with the pretty smile.‘It’s a GIRL? Wait, did I also call her pretty in my helm just now!?’
Relationships: Bumblebee & Sari Sumdac, Bumblebee/Charlie Watson, Charlie Watson & Sari Sumdac, Drift/Ratchet (Background)
Series: Charbee Week Prompts [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2058090
Comments: 5
Kudos: 26
Collections: CharBee Anniversary





	Speed Your Love To Me

**Author's Note:**

> For Charbee Week Day 1: “Unchained Melody” by Sam Cooke

Loose TFA continuity: Just imagine it still being set during Season 1, ~~way~ before Megatron gets his body back.~~

Hope you all enjoyed my contribution to Charbee week! :)

* * *

The inside of the Autobot base felt stifling to Bumblebee. Ever since everybot but Ratchet left hours ago on various missions Bee thought it meant he could have run of the place for once. While the mini-bot did get to do basically whatever he wanted as long as he didn’t bother the medic in his room he soon faced a serious problem.

Bumblebee got bored.

Sure, he could watch TV or play one of his games, but it wasn’t fun without the others around to comment or compete against, not that the young bot would ever admit it aloud. Instead Bumblebee tried to find something to keep his processor entertained but found nothing new and exciting enough to keep it engaged for more than a couple of kliks.

_When was the last time I looked at my chronometer?_ Bee thought. The last time he checked the time read four minutes after 1 o’clock. Surely more times must have passed since then.

**Chronometer:** 1305 Earth Hours

_Only 1 klik has passed?_ Bee groaned despairingly. There was no way he was going to survive until Boss-bot and the others came back. Right after the mini-bot sat down on the concrete couch his blue optics landed on the door to Ratchet’s office.

_For the love of the AllSpark, am I desperate enough to bother Doc-bot? … I guess I am._ the black and yellow Autobot ex-vented.

“Hey Ratch’ I thought I’d—are you talking to someone?” Bee interrupted himself after he noticed the older mech sitting in front of a screen.

Ratchet pressed a button the blackened the screen so Bee didn’t get a chance to see who he was talking to. “Haven’t you heard of knocking?” he asked harshly.

“Uh, might’ve forgotten about it,” the black and yellow bot half-truthfully said while scratching the back of his helm. “So, what are you up to in here?”

“None of your slagging business, that’s what.” The ambulance crossed his arms over his bulging chassis. “Don’t you have one of those game videos to listen to or something?”

Bee rolled his optics. “They’re called video games, Ratch’, don’t pretend you don’t know what those are. And I already replayed all the ones I own,” he added with a pout.

“Then why don’t you go ask Sari to borrow one of hers?” the medic asked impatiently. “She seems to always have a new one every time I hear you talk with her.”

The younger Autobot’s dermas formed into a wide grin. “Hey, you’re right! I can go hang out with Sari. Duh, why didn’t I think of that earlier?”

“AllSpark knows why,” Ratchet said with a shake of his helm. “Can you please leave now?”

“Why?” Bee’s smiled morphed into a smirk. “Was I interrupting something between you and somebot? I didn’t even know we could contact anybot from Cybertron yet.”

“Just get out of here already,” Ratchet said while he physically pushed Bee out of his room before shutting the door. A nano-klik later he opened it again to add, “And don’t call me Ratch’!” before slamming it once more.

“Sheesh,” the black and yellow car said. “You try to have one conversation with a teammate and they end up being so rude,” Bee muttered, oblivious to the fact that he was a little rude himself. After he collected a can of oil and some of his remaining preserved Energon goodies that were still edible, the mini-bot transformed into his small square shaped sports car mode. Then he drove out of the base, heading for the tallest building in Detroit.

* * *

“-and so the best way to neutralize nitric acid hydrochloride is by pouring it over a large block of ice with a 10% of sodium hydroxide added before it is safe to be dumped into your laboratory’s drain,” the Tutor-bot continued to drone in his emotionless voice.

Sari Sumdac was ready to hit her head against the wall from how bored she was feeling. It’s not to say she hated learning new things (she did have a high enough IQ to warrant her staying out of the public school system, according to her dad), but the way Tutor-bot lectured was beyond dull. He could make the most exciting moment in history, like the day the Autobots came to Earth, sound completely unexciting. The ten-year-old was tempted to just use her AllSpark Key on Tutor-bot to mess with its processor (again), but she made a promise to her dad to stop doing that or else she wasn’t going to get _Ninja Gladiator II_ for Christmas.

_Ugh, the things I do for love… and bribes,_ the redheaded girl thought while doodling in her notebook, pretending to be taking notes. _I wish something cool could happen, but I’m stuck here I guess my whole day is gonna stink once Dad goes to his seminar and leaves me with-_

The elevator to the top floor of Sumdac Tower dinged as the sound of screeching tires followed. A familiar looking yellow compact sports car with a single horizontal black stripe sped through the penthouse. The car made sure to avoid furniture and other household pieces, but did unintentionally ran over the robot that was in the middle of teaching Sari chemistry.

“Bee!” Sari shouted, jumping up from her seat on the couch and glaring at the mini-bot. “You aren’t supposed to drive inside peoples apartments. My dad just had the last rug your tires ruined replaced a month ago… I think you also owe him a new Tutor-bot.” She shrugged an arm towards the newly flatten robot pancake lying on the floor in a pool of oil.

“Oh, right. Sorry, I forgot about that,” Bumblebee said while shifting into his robot mode. He gave her one of his winning smiles in hopes that it would simmer her anger a bit.

The smile seemed to do the trick as Sari’s frown lessened and then shook her head. “What are you doing here?”

“Here to make your Tuesday way cooler than it was before,” the black and yellow bot announced.

“Okay, but what I mean is why are you here? Doesn’t Optimus normally have you on patrol this time of the day?”

“Yeah, usually, but today Prime is at the Mayor’s office to talk about some boring stuff related to construction work while Bulkhead and Prowl both said they had to go see those Dinobots and left a couple hours ago.”

“Really? So they just left you at the base?” the girl commented.

Bee nodded his helm in agreement. “Well, just me alone with the Doc-bot and he cooped himself in his room chatting with somebot he wouldn’t let me know about. I got so bored with nothing cool to do so I thought why not go meet my best human friend.”

“I’m you’re only human friend, Bee,” the ten-year-old said with a giggle.

“Hey, I have a life outside of you. I could have millions of human friends you don’t know about,” he teasingly said.

“Yeah, right, sure you do,” she said, playfully rolling her eyes at him.

“I was thinking we could go a few rounds of Ninja Gladiator for a couple hours, watch a movie and grab a bite at _Burger Bot_ when you get hungry later.”

The little girl’s dark eyes widened at all the ideas her friend suggested. “That sounds super awesome Bee… but I don’t think I can,” she said the last part with a downtrodden expression.

Bee quirked his head while displaying a confused look. “What do you mean you can’t? Did the professor ground you or something?”

Sari sighed. “I almost wish my dad grounded me. It would be so much better than what he’s actually going to do.”

“Just tell me already,” the yellow mech said.

“My dad has this speech thing he’s presenting at a robotics convention down at his old university, _Michigan State_.”

“He’s not dragging you to that is he?” Worry was laced in the young Autobot’s tone.

Sari shook her head. “Nope. He learned long ago how much those things bore me so he usually sets me up with a robot to watch over me, like Tutor-bot. But after he found out how much I like messing them up with the AllSpark Key, he told me for now on he was…”

“He was what?”

The redheaded girl swallowed a nonexistent lump in her throat before announcing, “he’s hiring a real person to babysit me!”

Bumblebee reset his optics twice before his confused stare from earlier returned. “Your dad is hiring somebody to sit on you? You aren’t even a baby anymore. At least that’s what you told me and the rest of the team after we first met you.”

In spite of herself the girl let out a small giggle. “No, Bee, babysitting is just a word for when a teenager or grown-up is put in charge of looking after somebody younger than them.”

“Oh, why didn’t you just say that?”

Sari heaved a sigh. “You’re missing the point, Bee. My dad is going to put somebody I don’t even know in charge of watching my every move while he’s gone.”

“You don’t know the person you’re dad is hiring at all?”

The girl shrugged. “Well, the only thing I remember him mentioning was that the guy’s name is Charlie and he’s really into machinery. Oh, and he’s from California.”

“Doesn’t sound very impressive to me,” Bumblebee said, crossing his arms.

Sari nodded while frowning. “I bet this Charlie guy is only here because he just wants to see my dad’s robots and ignore me the whole time… Like every other kid or teenager I meet.”

“Hey, you’re the most awesome human I know. Any human who thinks otherwise is dumb.”

“Thanks, Bumblebee.”

“And if this Charlie doesn’t want to hang out with you… well, I’ll show ‘im why you don’t mess with the Bee,” the black and yellow bot smiled mischievously, showing off his servo-turned stingers.

Sari smiled. Her mood brightened considerably.

“’Cause then you’ll get stung,” the two friends finished together before laughing out loud. They were enjoying themselves so much that they didn’t even hear someone walk in.

“-and up here is my private office and apartment. The kitchen is down on the right with plenty of food for snacks until-Sari, where is your Tutor-bot?” a short man in his early sixties said in befuddlement after pausing his tour.

Sari ceased her laughter at once to smile sheepishly at her father. “Uhh, well, uh, Bee showed up and-”

“Oh, my apologies Bumblebee,” Professor Sumdac said to the Autobot, bowing in embarrassment. “I didn’t notice you were there.”

“I’m an alien robot that’s half the size of a bus how could you not notice me?” the black and yellow bot said, sounding a little affronted.

“He came here to hang out after my lessons… ended with Tutor-bot.” Sari wasn’t sure when it would be a good time to tell her dad about her robotic teacher’s unfortunate demise.

“Well, I hope he doesn’t mind that your babysitter will be staying to watch over you,” he said, making sure to give her one of his ‘Please don’t cause any trouble while I’m away’ stares.

“Don’t worry, Dad. Bee’s cool with it, right?” She gave her buddy a knowing grin. The same smile they would share before doing something sly. Like pulling pranks on a potentially boring person they were forced to spend the next five hours with?

Bee mirrored her smirk perfectly.

“Sari, Bumblebee, I’d like you both to my the child of my former apprentice, Robert Watson. Please welcome, Charlie Watson.”

Sari had an image in her mind over what Charlie Watson looked like. What reality gave her instead was quite the surprise.

* * *

Bumblebee knew for a fact that he and the rest of Spacebridge Repair crew hadn’t been on Earth for very long, but they were fast learners. One of the big first things the Autobots learned was telling the difference between the genders of mech (male) and femm (female) humans. Females tended to have short builds, and a different body shape than men did for a start. They had a lot more curves around where their waist was and… well, they also tended to have larger… chestplates? Bee didn’t exactly remember what the correct term for that human anatomy was, but he wasn’t interested in asking just yet.

He was far too busy looking at Sari’s new babysitter.

The human was a head taller than the professor (most people were, to be honest) with a thin frame that had some muscles on the calves and arms. On their back was a large green duffle bag that looked kinda heavy, but didn’t seem to bother the human in anyway. That was still not the thing that surprised Bumblebee.

_Wait, that’s not a boy human._ the black and yellow Autobot thought as he took one long stare at the brown haired and eyed human with the pretty smile.

_It’s a GIRL?—Wait did I also call her pretty in my helm just now!?_ Bee’s internal processor glitch-ed while he panicked.

It wasn’t any girl Bumblebee had seen before. She wasn’t wearing the type of bright, streamlined clothes everyone else in Detroit wore. Hers appeared to be much older looking fabric over her skin that also had the name of a band that Bumblebee didn’t recognize. His processor did a quick search and learned the band ( _The Smiths_ ) were popular during the late 20th Century on Earth. She also wore several rubber bracelets on her arms and a small necklace with some very strange charms on it. Her ears had a few rings on the lobes and the upper cartilage.

Bumblebee thought he heard Prowl tell him that style of dress was known as Punk and was very popular during the late 1980s through the 1990s. Apparently the young woman was very much into that dated fashion trend and yet, she made it work even though Bee for the Spark of him couldn’t completely understand why.

“You’re a girl?” Sari said, voicing out what Bumblebee thought a few moments prior.

The shorthaired female slanted her head to her left, giving the redheaded child a wry smile. “The last time I checked, I was.”

Sumdac stuttered, “Oo-oh, I’m sorry.” He looked over at his daughter. “I thought I had told you that your babysitter was Robert’s daughter. It must’ve slipped my mind.”

_It wouldn’t be the first time,_ Bee noted while his optics were trained on Charlie still.

“O-kay,” Sari said warily. She walked over until she was standing face-to-face with Charlie. Her head barely reached the older girl’s mid-section. “So, what do you like to do?”

Bee recognized that tone as the ‘you better have a good answer or you won’t be worth paying attention to’.

Charlie placed her hands on her hips and smiled at the younger human. “I like working on machinery, robots and cars are my specialty. I usually listen to music while I’m doing it.”

“What kinda music?”

“Classic or alternative rock are a couple of my favorites along with heavy metal and anything with a synth,” Charlie pointed to one of her bracelets with the words _Twisted Sister_ written over the black plastic.

_Huh,_ Bee thought. _Sounds similar to what Sari and me like._

“I’m also into some video games thanks to my brother’s influence.”

“Ever played _Ninja Gladiator_?” Sari asked with an arched eyebrow.

Charlie’s smile turned dangerous. “Does your dad build robots for a living?”

“…. Okay, she’s clear.” Sari said after giving the older female another once-over.

Sumdac sighed in relief. “That’s wonderful to hear. I best be heading off so I won’t be late for the convention.”

Both girls bid the scientist a farewell as the man with the wild hair made his way back to the elevator that Bee thankfully didn’t destroy from his grand entrance earlier.

“So, have you heard of The Smiths?” Charlie asked Sari as they made their way over to the couch.

“No. Are they your neighbors?”

Charlie laughed, her voice sounding soft and light to Bee’s audial receptors. “No. They’re a band from the 1980s.”

Sari’s brown-red eyes widened in shock. “But that’s like over a hundred years ago. How do you know about that?”

“Yeah, you can’t be that old? Can you?” Bee spoke. He had just realized that this was probably the longest he has ever went without talking.

Charlie gave them both an amused stare before answering, “I know the music from that era because my dad lived during the third time people were reliving the 1980s.”

“Oh, how like people this age like to relive early 2000s neo-punk style,” Sari said.

“Exactly,” the brown-haired girl said. She and Sari plopped down on the couch as the game console warmed up. Charlie then looked over at Bee and noticed that he was still kind of standing awkwardly by the entrance to the living room. “Don’t you want to come join us?”

Bee snapped out of the trance he was in and eloquently said, “Uh?”

“Yeah, after Charlie and I play a couple rounds you can play the winner,” Sari suggested. “I should warn ya, Charlie, Bee is like the best gamer I know and I’ve been playing video games before I could walk.”

Charlie glanced at Bee once more with her brown eyes shimmering at him. Bee felt his intake become dry when she smirked and said, “I better have my A-game prepared then. I hope you won’t mind me wiping the floor with your windshield wipers after we’re done.”

“Oooooooh,” Sari uttered. “Shots fired, Bee.”

Charlie’s challenge was enough to bring the mini-bot out of his second stupor and he grinned. “Oh yeah? I’d like to see you try, Char-lee.”

The girl’s eyes crinkled. “Bring it on.”

**~Two Hours Later~**

“GAME OVER! VICTORY TO PLAYER 2” the obnoxious announcer to _Mystery of Convoy_ cried out over Sari’s cheering and Bumblebee’s groaning.

“That was a really close game.” The black and yellow sports car heard Charlie say while mopping the sweat off of her forehead. “Sari wasn’t kidding when she said you were good.”

“That game was like impossible to beat,” Bee whined, laying on the ground as though he had been knocked out by Colossus Rhodes again.

“Ehh, it’s pretty difficult, but nowhere as annoying hard like _Battletoads_ ,” Charlie let out a shudder. “I can still remember my brother getting so upset after losing so many times that he almost threw our console out of the window.”

“Reminds me of my dad when he couldn’t get his recent invention working,” Sari said, laughing a little bit.

“Yeah,” Charlie said. “My dad used to get frustrated over projects, too.”

Bee lifted his helm while watching the two girls talk animatedly with each other. His optics did however notice that Charlie’s smile wavered slightly when she talked about her dad. Right as he was starting to wonder if there was something wrong the digits on his right servo started to convulse.

“Is something the matter, Bee?” Sari asked after noticing the strange tic.

“Nothing!” Bee tried to wave off her worries with his servo but then it became rigid and he could no longer move it. “Aw, slag. What’s happening to me?”

“Would it be alright if I took a look?” Charlie asked, starting to stand up.

“Uh, I don-”

“I’ll be gentle. I promise,” she said in a calm, reassuring voice.

The look she gave him along with the promise of feeling better compelled Bumblebee to listen to her even though he wasn’t sure why yet. He allowed Charlie to take him down to one of the labs on the first floor so they wouldn’t make a mess with Sari helping them get inside with a new ID card key she got to replace her old one.

Charlie enraptured Bee with how she moved her hands around his armor. She carefully looked to see if there was anything obstructing the wiring on the air pumps that helped with moving his servos. She then asked if she could connect her tablet to one of the ports in his arm to run a diagnostic.

“You really do know a lot about robots,” Sari said, sounding very impressed.

Charlie smiled slightly. “I’ve always been into machines since as long as I can remember.”

The younger girl licked her lips. “I’m gonna go get something to drink at the break room. They also have too many sodas in there. Do you want anything?”

“If you have some _Robo-cola_ that would be great,” Charlie shouted behind her back while Sari made her way out of the lab. Bee started to get a little bit nervous after watching his best human friend leave. He didn’t know the other girl all that well and being alone with her made him feel that strange sensation again.

  
  
It was hauntingly similar to when he, Bulkhead and Sari were confronted by that techno-organic ‘con, Blackarachnia, but with two major differences.

Charlie proved to be a pretty nice person who treated Bee and Sari with a lot of respect and she wasn’t even trying to flirt with him.

_Why would I care about wanting her to flirt with me?_ Bee asked himself.

“-Bee!”

“Huh?” The black and yellow mech reset his optics. “What?”

He looked down to see Charlie expressing an annoyed look at him. “I’ve been trying to call your name for the last minute and a half.”

“Oh, sorry,” the mini-bot frowned in embarrassment. He was normally not this spacey.

“I was trying to tell you that I found what might’ve been the cause to your little malfunction earlier,” she explained.

“What was it?”

“Turns out you had a virus in your system and slowed some of your movements,” Charlie revealed her tablet, showing a virtual version of a tiny code that was never a part of Bee’s software.

“Wow,” Bee ex-vented. “You found that under all my coding? It’s so small! I didn’t even feel it.”

“I always look in-between the lines for situations just like this,” Charlie said. “My dad taught me that.”

“He showed you a lot of things, huh?” Bee mused while Charlie removed her cable out of Bee’s port and from her tablet.

“Yeah,” she said, her smile not as bright as before. Charlie then noticed the bot’s staring and cleared her throat. “You know I have something I should tell you.”

“What’s that?”

“Well, there was another reason why I accepted Uncle Isaac’s offer to babysit,” Charlie said.

_Probably like what Sari said earlier,_ Bee thought with a sense of dread.

“Don’t get me wrong, Sari is a pretty great kid and spending time with her has been a lot of fun so far, but… I was also really looking forward to meeting you when I first arrived in Detroit.”

Bee did a double-take. “You wanted to meet the Autobots?”

Charlie grinned. “Ever since I heard and saw you guys on the news back in September I just couldn’t stop thinking about it. I mean, here are five alien robots from another planet living among humans and protecting a whole city and the world from evil alien robots and crazy villains who looked like they all jumped out of a Saturday morning cartoon show.”

Bee couldn’t help but chuckle at the comparison. He had seen enough human television to get the joke.

“You’re not only proof that there’s life beyond planet Earth, but sentience in robots can be possible.”

“Yeah, but nobot can have the same smooth moves as me,” Bee boasted, puffing out his chestplate.

Charlie giggled (which did some funny things to Bee’s fuel pump) and smiled at him (and that made his Spark pulsate faster). “Ever since that day I wanted to find a way to meet you.”

“Maybe I can introduce you to the other Autobots,” Bee blurted out involuntarily. He then realized that maybe showing her to his much bigger, stronger teammates wasn’t such a great idea. He didn’t want her to stop paying attention to him.

“I would like that,” she said kindly, but not sounding super excited by the prospect.

Suddenly Bee became a little protective of his colleagues. “What? You don’t want to?”

“No, no I would definitely.” she said right away. “I would really like to meet all of them. Especially the red and white one that turns into an ambulance.”

Bee gave her a funny look. “You mean Ratchet?”

“Yeah, I would like to hear what it’s like to be a medic for living robots. I would love to compare my mechanic skills with his and maybe even get some pointers if he’s not too busy,” she offered a nervous smile.

“Oh,” Bee said. “Maybe, if he’s in a good mood-which is almost never I might add since he’s like really grumpy all the time.”

“Ha,” Charlie barked. “I’ve had my share of cranky old men back where I’m from.”

“So, I guess you’ll also want to meet Prime too since he’s the leader and got that cool axe I guess. Oh, and you should introduce yourself to my pal, Bulkhead. He’s really into learning about Earth music and art. Prowl will definitely want to talk with you since he’s pretty into Earth things too, but mostly plants and other boring things like animals and dirt.”

“I love nature,” Charlie said, giving Bee a blank look. “I go on hikes, camping trips and bike rides all the time when I’m not busy with fixing cars.”

Bee backpedaled. “Did I say boring? I meant boringly dull without some friends,” he grinned wildly.

Charlie rolled her eyes in amusement. “I know what you meant. And that all sounds wonderful Bee, but you also forgot one more person.”

“I did?” Bee frowned. He was pretty sure there weren’t any other bots in the old Spacebridge repair crew. As far as he knew at least.

“I also want to spend a lot of time with you,” she clarified.

Bee gaped. “Really?”

“Yes,” she averted her gave for a moment, pulling some of her hair back behind her ear. “Out of all the Autobots, you’re my favorite.”

“I am,” Bee could’ve sworn that his Spark was literally spinning inside his chamber.

“Of course.”

“But I’m not-” _Big, strong, or got an awesome weapon like Boss-bot or Prowl do._ He refrained from saying the last part.

“Big or tough like the other guys?” She offered gently at him. When he nodded shamefully, he felt something soft against his newly functioning digit. Bee realized that it was Charlie’s whole hand encircled around it. “The reason I admire you is because even though you’re the littlest in the group and get knocked down a lot you always get back up. You fight with all of your strength no matter how bad the odds look against you. Even when I notice how scared you look on then news feeds you still do whatever you can to help protect the city and its people. To me that’s what a real hero is: somebody who does the right thing even when things look really bad.”

During the time Charlie spoke the humiliated look on Bee’s faceplate slowly went away and was replaced with his dermas forming a small ‘o’ as his optics were gazing intently at her. All the hums from the lab’s machines and loud honks from the nearby highway became static background noise to the mini-bot. All that mattered was listening and watching the human standing before him.

“I also think some of your snarkier one-liners are funny,” she said with a wink.

Bee snorted, pretending to look indignant. “Hey, all of my jokes are funny. I’ve got great material.”

Charlie laughed. “I’m sure you do.” She then looked away again before staring back at him with a bashful look in her eyes. “Can I say something a little bit weird?”

“I like weird,” he said. _And maybe even you._

The mechanic put both of her hands on the servo she was touching and smiled softly. “I also wanted to admit that I think you’re kinda cute. You know, in a robotic alien kind of way, if that makes any sense.”

“Y-you think I’m cute?” He pointed to himself with his free servo, gaping.

Charlie nodded, her face turning a light pink. “Yeah. You must think that’s really creepy, right? I’m sorry-I shouldn’t have said-”

“No!” he yelped before recomposing himself. “No, I mean… I don’t mind it.”

“Really?” she asked, sounding relieved.

“Yeah,” Bee said and his vocalizer totally didn’t come off like a squeak. Nope. Not at all. “I, uh, never really had anybot tell me that they thought I looked attractive before.” Scrawny, mudflap, bumbler were usually what came to mind back on Cybertron. No femm or mech ever showed an interest in a mech that could’ve been mistaken for a mini-con.

“Well, I don’t know if I should recommend you going on the Internet or not then,” Charlie said. “You and your teammates have a lot of fans on there… some of them say some really disturbing stuff,” she shuddered. 

“I’ll take your word for it… but I think the Internet is where I got that virus when I was downloading a new game.”

The two of them laughed after Bee made that joke. Once they stopped Bee noticed Charlie removing her hands off his arm. He started to feel a little sad when she did that. The mini-bot then thought of something else he wanted to say to her.

“I-”

BOOM!

Bumblebee and Charlie collectively winced from the loud noise and the unexpected aftershocks. Bee even went as far as to wrap his arms around Charlie in case anything fell from above.

“What was that?” Charlie asked after everything stopped trembling.

“I don’t know.” Bee said to the girl. He then lifted up his arm to project a hologram of the tower’s security footage. Not long after Prometheus “Meltdown” Black had broke into Sumdac Systems, Mr. Sumdac gave the Autobots full access to his security systems so they could always be on the look out for anymore incoming threats. Bumblebee explained all of that to Charlie while he used his admission to scour the security video recording.

  
  
“Okay, nothing in the storage room, docking bay, or the secret underground labs I probably shouldn’t be saying aloud right now… and wait!” Bee shouted, startling Charlie. “I found something in the camera facing the front entrance.”

He replayed the footage so Charlie could see and both watched as the glass doors of the front shattered into a billion little pieces as fire and smoke concealed the rest of the video feed.

“Looks like we got ourselves a break-in,” Bee said.

“Who would be dumb enough to barge right through the main gates?” Charlie said while crossing her arms.

“I can think of a couple of humans who might be stupid enough and I’m on their slag list,” the bot said with a vent.

“Wait, this is happening on the first floor,” Charlie said a moment later. “And the break room Sari went to get sodas is on which floor?”

“The first,” Bee said, his optics shrinking in horror.

“Sari!” they both shouted at the same time.

“You go find her while I go say _hello_ to our uninvited guests,” Bee said to Charlie.

“Where’s the break room exactly?” she called as he started to run out.

“Down the first hall you see in the lobby, third door on the left!” he yelled right back at her while he activated his stingers. _I really wish I could use the full power of these things. But they’re gonna have to do for now. Oh, wait, I should call for back up._ The bot nearly slapped himself. “Duh. Slag, I must be suffering from a glitch.”

He turned on his comm. and called out to his teammates. ::Guys, we’ve got something major going on at the plant. I need you all here like, yesterday!::

All he could get at the other end of the line was static.

::Guys?:: Bee attempted to call all of them again. _Slag,_ he cursed. _Whoever broke in must be jamming my comm.’s radio signal._

Bee skidded to a halt once he made it to the stairs and climbed them up until he was up in the ground floor again. The smoke had dissipated finally and Bee could see a dozen people unconscious and tied up, including the tower’s security. As Bee evaluated the situation his optics soon landed on something at the other end of the main lobby. It had to have been the intruder.

“What?” He had to reset his optics twice once he recognized who the intruder _s_ were.

The ever flowing green acidic mad scientist Meltdown stood with a couple of his ‘pets’ while next to them was the oversized robotic head that belonged to no one else but the Headmaster.

“Aww, great I gotta deal with these two guys again?” the black and yellow sports car muttered. Meltdown and Headmaster had to have been two of Bee’s least favorite villains with how annoying they acted. And having to deal with both of them at once? By the AllSpark, Optimus better let him have a day off for real.

“I thought you said none of those low-grade n00bs were gonna be here,” the whiny voice belonging to Henry Masterson complained through his robot’s speakers towards the green mutant.

“I said they _might_ be with my spies watching them and finding out they will all be off on their own devices,” Meltdown snapped back at Headmaster.

Bee was momentarily distracted by the two villains’ banter and tilted his helm in confusion. “Spies?—GAH!” Bee shouted out a cry of pain when he felt two sharp claws stab right through the plating in his back. He turned around to see two large pairs of red eyes staring back at him. The mini-bot only had enough time to stare before he was lifted up in the air simultaneously by the two large gray and black monsters with wings protruding under their arms. Bumblebee also spotted them wearing collars on their necks with flashing lights.

_I guess that’s how they’ve been spying on us,_ Bee thought dryly.

“Do you like them? I’ve noticed how despite your group’s so-called machine superiority your battles between the flying robots you’ve faced always appeared one-sided. So, with some brilliant thinking on my part, I created two of my most incredible experiments yet. I managed to marry the two forms of both man and beast.”

“Marriage?” Headmaster choked out. “You’re sick, you know that?”

“Not like that, you ignorant technophile!”

“What the slag are you two doing here?” Bee demanded while trying to free himself from the creatures’ grasp. “If you’re looking for Professor Sumdac I hate to break it to you but he’s nowhere here. In fact he’s in a far away location where you can never find him,” he fibbed in a smug voice.

“You mean the convention center? We already know that’s where he is,” Meltdown said bluntly.

_What’s the phrase that one cartoon character likes to use? Oh, right, D’oh!_ Bee thought with a wince.

“Yeah, we came here instead of crashing the con the old man is at so we both could get back at him for firing us.” Headmaster griped.

“Wait,” Bee paused his struggling. He tilted his helm to look at Meltdown. “You used to work for Prof. Sumdac, too? But didn’t you have your own business before you became all…acid-y?”

“I had to build my own business because that guileless fool never wanted to accept the pure genius of my brilliant ideas!” Meltdown cried. 

“Turning unwilling humans into furries is your idea of brilliant?” Bee asked, deadpan.

The acidic mutant yelled in complete angrish. “Man-bats, drop that bucket of bolts at a higher altitude so he may crash against the ground.”

“Yeah, not gonna do that,” Bee said as he brandished his stingers and jabbed them on the man-bats’ legs. They shrieked from the pain and (as Bee predicted) let him go. He angled himself so that the oversized head of Headmaster’s new bot body broke his fall instead of landing on the concrete floor.

“So Head-disaster, which junkyard did you scrounged up your new suit? I heard this city used to be a real dump before the professor started his robotic business,” Bee taunted.

“I gonna yeet you so hard, lame-o!” Headmaster yelled as he willed his robotic limbs to push himself back up. 

Bee rolled his optics. “Slag, your trash-talk is worse than Boss-bot’s.”

The mini-bot then shouted out when he felt another sharp pain in his backside, this time it was not from talons but a harsh burning sensation. Bumblebee fell over to his side, cringing from the severe pain he was feeling.

“This is going to be too easy.” Both villains laughed maniacally while the man-bats screeched along with them.

_Well… at least Sari and Charlie will be okay…_ Bee thought.

“We better send those bat freaks of yours to go snatch the old man’s kid.

_D’oh._

* * *

“Why isn’t my phone working?” Charlie scowled while fighting back the urge to chuck her smartphone at the nearest wall.

“Mine isn’t working either,” Sari said. “I’ve been hearing this weird beeping noise for like ten minutes now and I think its related to why we can’t send any wireless messages or call anyone.”

“Your ears must be way better than mine,” Charlie mused. Though listening to loud music in her headphones for the last ten years might’ve had something to do with her hearing not being as good as a ten-year-old’s.

“Who could be jamming the building’s systems?” she then asked.

“Somebody who is either really great at technology or knows how the building works,” Sari replied.

“Or perhaps both.” Charlie said in a worried tone. In the distance she heard the sound of shrill roaring mixed with another yell that made her concern.

“Why did I just hear a bat cry if it was mixed with a human yell?”

“Oh no.” Charlie looked over at her charge and saw her red-brown eyes shrink. “That’s Meltdown. He’s here!”

“I thought he was the guy covered in acid.”

“Yeah, but he also likes to make…. What did you say his minions looked like to you again?”

“That they look like _Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle_ knock-off villains?” Charlie said.

“Yeah, he makes those and tried to turn me into one once,” Sari said in a frightened voice.

“He did what?” Charlie asked in an extremely flat tone. Normally Charlie believed that violence never solved real problems and nobody should ever kill somebody without a judge and jury to decide first, but for once in her life she was very, very tempted to do the job herself. But then she cleared up her mind by taking a deep breath and focused on the issue at hand.

There was a mad biochemist obsessed with getting even with Sari and Uncle Isaac and possibly hurt Bumblebee. Charlie had to do whatever it took to protect Sari from any harm.

“Hey where do you think you’re going?” she asked right as Sari started to slide off the chair she was sitting in.

“I gotta do something to help Bumblebee,” Sari said resolutely. 

“Bee told me to keep an eye on you.”

“Listen, you’ve seen all the news about the Autobots, right?” Sari asked. She stood in front of Charlie, putting her hands on her hips. “Then you must know that Meltdown is a pretty dangerous guy. He shoots acid that’s harmful to the metal plating the Autobots have. We gotta do something to help or else something bad might happen to Bee.”

Charlie opened her mouth to protest when she heard the screeching getting louder and then followed by the voice of a young man ranting in gamer lingo she only heard her brother use when he played online.

“Oh great, I think Headmaster is here too,” Sari complained.

“Okay, you’re right. We can’t let Bumblebee fight those guys be himself.”

“So we’re gonna take down some baddies?” the redhead said excitedly.

Charlie quickly shot that idea down. “Let’s think this plan through, okay? Charging right into danger when we’re two squishy humans against a man made out of acid, whatever the heck his pets are, and a giant robot head aren’t the best odds in my opinion.”

Sari sighed but muttered a fine before she allowed Charlie to guide her safely out of the break room. The two girls stealthily crept around corners in the hallway before the elder poked her head out to scrutinize the lobby. Her brown eyes landed on four figures ganged up around a black and yellow shape on the floor. Three guesses who that was.

“-I shall have my revenge by taking not only the one person Sumdac treasures, but I’ll even melt this entire place down until there is nothing left but the smoking remains of Sumdac’s so-called legacy. I will make it so that-”

“Wow, he sure likes monologuing, doesn’t he?” Charlie lampshaded. By this point she was tuning out most of what the green monster was sputtering.

Sari grumbled, “Yeah, he’s a real jerk. He used to do those kind of speeches even when he used to work with my dad.”

“I think _my_ dad mentioned a Prometheus Black once. Said he was impossible to get along with when they were both interns here.”

“We have to do something to help Bee,” Sari said, driving the conversation back to their captive friend.

“Right,” Charlie shook her head. She needed to focus. Her eyes trailed off from Sari’s face and towards a familiar T-shaped item attached to a black cord.

“Do you think you could use that special key of yours to turn communication back on so we could call the police and the Autobots?” Charlie asked, remembering the stories Sari told about how her Key could do some pretty incredible things with technology.

“I tried putting my key in a port near the break room, but I think whatever that signal is, it’s jamming it.”

“I bet you anything Headmaster is behind it,” Charlie said. “Maybe if we go to the main office we can turn the Wi-Fi back on manually.”

“I can do that with my Key for sure.”

  
  
Charlie nodded while her eyes trailed off and looked over at Bumblebee’s comatose form. She was starting to worry that her favorite Autobot really was done for when the two villains made their advancements towards their captive. Bee surprised both her and his two opponents by suddenly jumping up and shooting a blast of electricity at them once he was standing straight again.

“Oh, yeah Bee’s alright,” Sari cheered.

“Shh,” Charlie reminded the younger girl, placing a finger over her lips for emphasis. “We can’t let those bad guys know we’re here.”

During the fight between Bee, Headmaster and Meltdown the mutant man attempted to pelt the mini-bot with globs of acid. Bee ducked his helm to avoid the green acid and it flew overhead and was heading towards the spot Charlie and Sari were hiding in.

“Get down,” she whispered loudly enough for Sari to hear her. They both evaded the corroding liquid in the nick of time and it instead came in contact with the cement.

“Gross,” Sari recoiled from the burning smell.

“That’s some really strong dissolvent,” Charlie noted. “I wonder if its like Aqua Regia since it can melt metal so quickly.”

“Wait, you said this looks like Aqua Regia acid?” Sari asked abruptly while pointing at the simmering bile. 

“Yeah,” Charlie nodded, unsure why the kid was asking her this. “Learned about it back when I was still in high school.” Too bad she couldn’t remember most of her lessons.

“I think I have an idea on how to stop Meltdown,” the younger girl said excitedly.

“Well, lay it on me.”

“All I need is one of your super loudest tapes you got and help me sneak so I can head to the chem. lab.”

“But what about the main-”

“Trust me, this will help Bumblebee a lot just as much as calling for help,” Sari insisted with pleading eyes.

Charlie blinked twice at the girl but decided not to question it. After hearing all the stories Sari got in to while helping the Autobots the mechanic believed that giving the little girl the benefit of the doubt was a smart idea. Charlie pulled out a tape she always carried in her pocket and handed it to Sari.

“Thank you!” Sari said and then started running.

“Wh-where are you going?” Charlie yelled at the retreating girl.

Sari paused mid-step and shouted back, “Just a quick shortcut before I’ll head to the chem. lab… By the way you said you took a virus out of Bee’s system, right?”

“Sure.”

“Is there a chance you can move that to someplace else?”

Charlie held a confused stare a first before it melted into a look of realization. Then she smirked. “I think I have a good idea of where to _transplant_ it safely.”

Sari grinned evilly. “I just knew we’d get along, Charlie.”

  
  
“Oh, really?”

“Hey! It’s the brat!” one of the villains said.

“Whoops, gotta go!” Sari said before making a hasty exit to the other end of the lobby.

“One of you go get her!” Charlie knew that was Meltdown that time as she saw him point to one of his bat-man-things and then towards the hall Sari just ran inside.

_Oh, no you don’t._ Charlie thought determinedly as she picked up some fallen rubble and clasped in her hand. As the bat-man started to flap its wings at a higher speed and drew closer to the other hallway Charlie mustered five years worth of Little League baseball skills and threw the rock which then…

Fell ten feet away from her and only alerted the bat-creature and the villains of her presence.

“Charlie!” Bee shouted in alarm after he saw her.

_Oops,_ Charlie thought, wanting to faceplam so badly at her mistake.

The bat moved his attention away from Sari and instead charged to go after the mechanic. It flew closer and closer to Charlie with its feet rising up to potentially grab her. She heard Bee shout her name again, but saw that Headmaster was blocking his path and wouldn’t be able to reach her in time. The bat-man was less than fifteen feet away.

_Eh, I was more of a hitter than a pitcher._ Charlie thought, picking up a fallen metal pipe and once the man-bat was close enough, whacked its head with all her might. She wasn’t sure if she was happy or upset to not hear the creature’s skull crack since it was probably one of Meltdown’s unwilling victims. Or his financial advisor.

Hearing Meltdown yelling at her alerted the girl of him shooting acid at her direction. Charlie dodged the onslaught by rolling behind a potted plant and jumped out of the way again when he spewed on the ficus.

_I guess I now owe Uncle Isaac a new plant and pot,_ Charlie thought sardonically. The tablet inside her backpack shook against the fabric but thankfully to her it sounded as though it wasn’t damaged. Her eyes locked on to the Headmaster’s form. She drew her lips into a thin line as she started to get closer to her goal only to get interrupted by familiar sounding screech.

_Oh, shoot forgot there’s two of them,_ Charlie remembered as the second man-bat landed right in front of her, baring its beady red eyes against her brown ones.

* * *

Sari had quickened her pace when she had heard the freaky-bat cries grow louder. Much to her surprise the screeching had not only ceased, but the mutant monster didn’t seem to be following her anymore. She had no idea what caused that to happen, but she did have a feeling that one of her friends had something to do with it.

It took Sari less than five minutes to reach the room that housed all the gear used to run the building automatically. Her Key allowed her to get inside after it overrode the glitching security system Headmaster must’ve messed with. The room was empty with no sign of the usual security guards, Jeff and Dale. They were probably the first to get captured and locked away somewhere. Due to Sari’s short stature she had to climb up on one of the wheelie chairs in order to see the computers and other screens. She gasped in shock after seeing Bumblebee and Charlie getting cornered by Masterson and the lone man-bat respectfully.

“All right, Key, I hope you’re smart enough to know how make this speaker system turn into a giant _Walkman_ ,” Sari said as she pushed the AllSpark Key inside a port. In a matter of seconds the bio-lights on the desk glowed brighter before they dimmed moments later. Once the light faded Sair could see a new port right above where the Key was located and even had the play, pause, fast-forward, rewind and stop buttons underneath it.

“Time for those bat-boys to face the music,” Sari exclaimed as she powerfully shoved Charlie’s mixtape into the new opening, hoping that her plan was going to work. She then pressed the play button and turned up the highest setting the building’s speakers had.

_Please work, please work,_ she chanted worriedly.

* * *

“Aww, looks like the babe isn’t going to save you after all, lame-o-bot,” Headmaster taunted at Bumblebee.

“Did anybody ever tell you how annoying your voice is?” Bee yelled. “’Cause it really is.”

“Shut up, n00b!” the oversized head yelled as its new body’s arm rose and was falling right over Bee’s helm.

Suddenly the loud riff from a guitar could be heard.

While Bee, Charlie and the villains initially winced at the sound the two bats on the other hand were not doing so hot. The mini-bot felt relief go through his Spark as he saw the one bat standing over Charlie start to shriek in pain and attempted to cover his very large ears with its small hands.

“NO!” Meltdown shouted. “How dare this accursed sound ruin my beautiful creations hearing!”

“Hey,” Bee heard Charlie call out. “Don’t disrespect Hendrix, you sicko. And your definition of what you consider to be beautiful really clashes with mine.”

_Mech, and here I thought Sari was the bravest human I know,_ Bee thought in amazement. Unfortunately Headmaster noticed his momentary distraction and pushed the Autobot aside.

After Bee recovered from the initial throbbing of getting punched into a wall he saw Charlie running towards him. She probably wanted to make sure he was okay. Just as Bee was starting to feel touched by Charlie’s concern both he and her were surprised when Headmaster blocked her path.

“You know, for a Grease Monkey chick, you actually look kinda hot,” Henry Masterson said to the young woman.

“Excuse me?” Charlie said in the flatest voice Bee ever heard.

“How about dump the rust bucket and the brat and hang out with a real pro-gamer like me?” the tech obsessed nerd flirted audaciously.

_What-WHAT!_ Bee thought as some foreign feeling flooded through his cerebral processor.

To his shock the mechanic looked like she was considering his offer?!

_WHAT!_

“Hmmm, golly, that does sound ‘very’ tempting except for one small thing,” she said with heavy sarcasm while putting her hands behind he back. Unknown to Bumblebee and the villain Charlie was slowly pulling out her tablet.

“What’s that, babe?” Bee could practically hear the lecherous grin on that stupid headhunting nerd. If it weren’t for how close Charlie was, standing in front of Headmaster, Bee would’ve clobbered that human in an instant.

“I don’t date freaks in weird clothes and make a living stealing from people and hurting them,” Charlie said a very serious tone as she revealed her tablet. “Oh, and looks like my new best friend just fixed the building’s Wi-Fi, ain’t that swell?”

“Huh?” Both Bee and Headmaster said.

Charlie smirked while pressing a button on her screen. “You how on the playground boys and girls usually ran away from each other because they were scared of getting cooties? Well, can ya guess what I just gave you?”

Headmaster lifted an arm up, right over Charlie’s head only for it to halt. “What did you do to me, you b-”

“Who knew a virus that originated from an advanced alien robot would do more harm to human tech that’s low-level in comparison.” Charlie said, cutting the techno geek off before she took a step back. Then she locked eyes with Bee and gave him a nod.

Bee didn’t need to be asked twice over what she was asking from him.

“Speaking of which,” she started to saw right as Bee took his chance and knocked the stalled Headmaster off his feet.

Bumblebee slammed the bigheaded robot on its back and for an extra measure decapitated it. He then used his stinger to short-circuit the drone so it wouldn’t move again. A side door opened and came out the weirdly uniformed Henry Masterson. He attempted to escape, but Bee caught him and handcuffed the human and tied him up to be on the safe side. The black and yellow mini-bot watched as Charlie marched up to the man who didn’t look that much older from her. Without any warning she slapped him so hard that Bee could feel the throbbing pain from where he stood. He was made out of metal, too so it must’ve really smarted.

“And nobody calls me Babe,” she said in a scathing voice, narrowing her eyes while pointing an accusatory finger at him. “I’m fine with Honey, Sweetheart, maybe Love if I’m feeling generous, but _nev-er_ Babe.” She slapped his face again before she pulled down an eyelid and said, “Nyeh!”

Okay, Bee couldn’t decide if that girl was crazy or amazing. _Perhaps both?_ A small file popped in his processor that he quickly tried to put away.

“Well, that was quite the teamwork you pulled,” the voice of Meltdown cut in.

Bee and Charlie whipped their helm and head respectfully and saw the acid-man stand two yards away from them.

“Oh, kinda forgot about him,” Bee said sheepishly as Charlie sighed.

“I appreciate that you did the work for me by subduing that irritating boy.”

“I thought we were partners!”

Meltdown barely regarded the detained villain with zero remorse over his predicament. “As much as it pains me to admit it, I only need the use of your _technology_ in order to gain entry without drawing any unwanted attention.”

“And your idea of sneaking in involves blowing up the front entrance?” Charlie asked. “Doesn’t really scream discrete to me.”

Bee couldn’t help but giggle at her crack.

“The only way the bomb would’ve gone unnoticed was if the security and wireless interlinking were turned off. And now that they’re turned back on I have little time left to enact my revenge by destroying this place and getting rid of everyone in it.”

“Yeah, like I’m gonna let you get away with that,” Bee said as he shifted to his battle stance.

“Your metal is weak against my acid, robot, and since you’ve shown me your weakness I know how I can really hurt you the most,” Meltdown exclaimed.

_My weakness?_ Bee thought in bemusement. Was the mad scientist referring to his metal plating? But why mention it twice? His thoughts went away once he noticed Meltdown was no longer looking at him but his black visor was now directed at Charlie’s direction.

_…no…_ Bee tightened his frame and his faceplate scrunched up. Without any form of hesitation he ran to stand in front of Charlie and block her from Meltdown’s path.

“How touching, but I’m afraid I’ll still melt her once I’m done with-” Meltdown didn’t get a chance to finish as two vats of liquid fell on his head. He had no chance to react as a large mass of ice then landed on him next.

Bee and Charlie watched in a mixture of awe and fear as the green mutant yelled as his body began to dissolve and shrink to half his size. They were so stunned by what they saw that they almost didn’t hear the loud whistling over Meltdown’s screams and the still playing rock music. When Bee looked up he found himself smiling in relief.

Above one story, a small redheaded girl was leaning casually against a railing. By her feet were two large containers with the words _lye_ and _caustic soda_ printed in black text. Next to them was a large cooler with a couple cubes melting outside of it.

“I told you, Charlie that I needed to go to the chem. lab!” Sari shouted after waving at the Autobot and human.

Bee watched Charlie laugh. “You were right about that. You were right about everything. You’re one smart kid.”

Sari giggled, looking very pleased. “I know.”

As Bee started to wonder why he liked watching the two girls banter playfully he heard the telltale ring from his communicator.

He answered the call and was bombarded with his teammates clamoring about what was going on. The Boss-bot and Ratchet’s vocalizers were the loudest out of the four, asking if he and the humans were all right?

::Yeah, we’re all good here:: Bee said after he was able to get a word in. ::It’s kind of a long, crazy story. It started when I decided to go visit Sari when-::

* * *

The angry scowls of the arrested Henry Masterson and Meltdown were the last Bee saw of them before a large truck owned by the Detroit Police Department carried the criminals back to their headquarters downtown.

“Those two punks are gonna be in prison for a long time if I had anything to say about it,” the every frowning Police Captain Fanzone said as the truck drove away.

“I cannot thank you all enough for apprehending those two,” Professor Sumdac said to both the human law enforcer and Optimus Prime who had arrived at the tower around the same time as the police.

“We really didn’t do all that much,” the humble red and blue firetruck said while he looked back at Bulkhead, Prowl and Ratchet. “It was all Bumblebee, Sari and their new friend who saved your building and all the people inside.”

“As much as I hate to admit it, the real heroes were those kids and that robot over there,” Fanzone nodded slightly as he thumbed over to the three people in question.

Bumblebee, Sari and Charlie were all engrossed with telling each other the previous events they had been involved in and gushed at each other’s skills or smart thinking. The three of them were in their own little world; unaware of the proud looks the older bots and humans were giving them.

“I better get back to HQ,” Fanzone announced. “I have a lot of paperwork to fill out after Meltdown and Masterson escaped from confinement the other day.”

After the man left, the Autobots and scientist went over to where the three heroes were sitting along the curb.

“And then Charlie was all like ‘Nyeh’ and stuck her tongue out and eye,” Bee said while mimicking the actions the mechanic had done previously.

Both Charlie and Sari laughed in amusement.

“Hey what about when you said, ‘Did anybody ever tell you how annoying your voice is’ to Headmaster? That almost made me laugh at how you delivered it,” Charlie said back to him.

“The one-liner you used on him about the cootie-thing was better.”

“Aww, thanks Bee.”

“Charlie.” The three young friends turned their heads to look at Sumdac who had just addressed the mechanic.

“It’s getting close to Sari’s bedtime and you should be heading back to your apartment,” the professor said.

“Right,” the brunette said, standing up while stretching her arms over her head.

“Bu-” Sari yawned. “I’m not-okay, yeah I’m getting sleepy,” the redhead was forced to admit. “But, wait did my dad just said you’re heading back to your apartment?”

“Yeah,” Charlie said with a nod.

“So, does that mean you’re staying here?” the little girl asked.

Charlie moved her eyes to the side while scratching her cheek. “I should hope so since I’m gonna be starting my internship here next week.”

Everyone besides the professor offered congratulatory words to the young woman, but nobot cheered louder than Bumblebee. 

“Boo-yeah!” the black and yellow mini-bot shouted jubilantly. He then stopped after noticing the looks his teammates and humans were giving him. Some were a mixture of surprise, confusion and one human in particular bearing a smile that Bee thought only cats in online videos were able to make. He chuckled sheepishly, tapping two of his digits together. “I-uh, am just really glad we’re gonna have a new human ally on our side?”

“That is something we’re all very pleased to hear about, Bumblebee,” his leader said neutrally, though there was also something hidden behind his blue optics that the younger mech couldn’t decipher.

“Though, some of us are a bit more vocal in response to the news, apparently,” the black and gold police motorcycle said with a raised optical ridge.

Bumblebee felt his faceplates getting warm while rubbing the back of his helm in embarrassment.

“I should be going,” Charlie said. “The traffic between here and downtown is going to be a nightmare.”

“I already had someone come to pick your car out of the garage,” Sumdac said. Right on cue one of Sumdac’s employees pulled up in a bright red and white sports car from a bygone era.

The Autobots and Sari watched Charlie sigh in relief. “I’m so glad that neither Meltdown on Headmaster broke in through the parking garage,” she said while walking up to the car.

“Is that a _Corvette_?” Sari asked, pointing at the car in surprise.

“This was mine and my dad’s project back when I was still in high school,” she smiled wistfully at the vehicle. “We’d work on it every weekend together.”

Bee remembered that wasn’t the first time he saw Charlie look troubled while mentioning her creator. Someday he might ask her what that was all about, but decided that today wasn’t that day.

“But it runs,” she said, her face forming a proud look. “Granted, my dad and I had to gut some of the old parts and replaced the motor with a hybrid engine, but it still moves like a dream.”

“Maybe we could go driving in the wilderness,” Bee found himself saying.

All optics and eyes turned to look at the young bot, but his were trained on Charlie.

  
  
“Like a race?” she suggested with a hopeful tone.

“Uh, sure, yeah. That be cool,” he said, trying his best to look and act smooth.

Charlie seemed to see through the façade, however, and then asked him to kneel down. When he did the mechanic walked up to him and placed a hand on his cheek. Before the mini-bot could comment Charlie pressed a small kiss where her hand had been a prior moment. The action stunned Bumblebee, causing his optics to widen and his dermas formed an ‘o’ like before.

Charlie giggled before she bid everyone else a farewell and promised Sumdac that she’d take another babysitting job. She got into her car and waved, but not before giving the not-out-of-his-stupor-yet Bumblebee a wink and drove down the road and through the main gates.

“What just happened?” Bulkhead asked after a full minute of stunned silence.

“Do you have any answer to this, Ratchet?” Prowl beseeched the war veteran.

Ratchet crossed his arms. “I’ve seen many things during my existence, believing nothing but seeing the AllSpark would ever surprise me… but **that**. That did surprise me.”

“Bee, are you okay?” Sari, being his more reasonable friend, asked.

Her question caught Bee’s attention again and he snapped out of his bewilderment. “Uh, yeah. I’m good.” He lifted his servo to give his friend a thumb’s up until he felt something stuck on his palm.

“What’s what in your hand?” she asked.

“It looks like paper to me,” Bulkhead noted after Bumblebee extended his servo to reveal a lime-yellow sticky note on it.

Bee must’ve been so shocked from the kiss that he hadn’t even noticed the paper she slipped in his servo. When he unfolded the paper he and the Autobots crowded around to see odd symbols written in black _Sharpie._

“It appears to be some kind of code?” the Prime said, looking a bit perplexed by what he saw.

“What do the hyphens between some of the numbers mean?” Bulkhead asked.

Next to the Autobots Sari laughed uproariously. “That’s not a code,” she said, giggling between breaths.

“What is it?” Bee asked.

“It’s so obviously her cell phone number. It means she wants Bee to call her up sometime,” she added when the bots continued to give her blank looks.

“What’s the meaning behind the pink marking right by the, uh, phone number?” Optimus asked.

“I think that might be lipstick,” Sari offered with a shrug.

Out of nowhere Bumblebee fainted.

“What?” all of his friends shouted. The all swarmed until they were standing before their fallen friend.

“Bee what’s wrong!” Bulkhead asked worriedly.

“I…”

“He’s trying to say something,” Sari said as she and the others waited to hear what his next words were.

“I think… I’m in love,” Bumblebee said in a daze as his Spark pulsed crazily.

The two humans and four Autobots exchanged glances with one another before looking back at Bumblebee. “Huh?” they all said together.

Their reactions didn’t matter Bee, as he later thought. What only mattered to him was getting the chance to see that fun, brave, cool mechanic again. Maybe he could convince her to ditch her car every once in a while on go on a ride with him. To think he originally thought he was going to hate Sari’s babysitter and see her as a killjoy.

If there was anything he learned during his time on Earth so far was that people were far more than they appeared to be.

**The End**

* * *

**Q-A:** So this story was born after seeing this fanart here (<https://shapeofmetal.tumblr.com/post/625291877091000320/some-charbee-doodles>). I thought this design of Charlie just fit so well in the TFA-verse it made me wonder how she’d interact with other characters. Obviously the only other character she really spent any meaningful time was with Sari, which is fine ‘cause I can see Charlie acting like a cool big sis to her, but I am disappointed that I didn’t put any moments with her and the other Autobots (maybe in a future story, IDK). And as for her and Bee, it’s not too different from RAS with how they get flustered around each other, but they’re a bit more forward on their feelings (instead of taking literal years, it took them like two hours after they met. ¯\\_(:\\)_/¯ ).

I feel like TFA!Bee would try to act all cool in order to impress Charlie, but he’d become his usual sassy dork self after she says something to trip him up. Charlie would be the pants in the relationship, acting as the more responsible one, but also get invested in his silly antics as long as it wasn’t ‘too’ dangerous.

Charlie would also bond with Ratchet here just like in RAS.

Charlie and Prowl would become best buds over their interest in nature (I’m basing her love of nature on the scene of her in the forest with ‘Bee from the movie) and star in their own buddy-cop spin-off together about ninja police people fighting _Captain Planet_ -like villains. XD

I think Charlie would be endeared by Bulkhead’s sweet disposition and interest in art.

As for Optimus’, she’d be the biggest supporter who’d act like his personal motivational speaker telling him that, ‘Yes, you totally are a hero, and those other Primes and Magnus-guy don’t know what they’re talking about ‘cause you’re a great guy, dammit!’ XD

Also she would verbally lash out at Megatron during the season 2 finale for kidnapping her ‘uncle’ and leaving her little ‘cousin’ an orphan (and that would not make Megatron impressed with a human for once, or make him see her as person of interest, nope).

Oh, and she would dope-slap Sentinel Prime in his face for ruining Optimus and Bee’s potential careers in the Elite Guard. You know she would.

~Please give comments, kudos and subscribe. I’ll answer any questions to the best of my abilities. :D And be sure to…

Keep on Writin’ and Rockin’

**Author's Note:**

> Just for the record, the bot Ratchet was talking to was Drift. They were both chatting about the benefits of Energon Tea while flirting/reminiscing about their old war cycles together. It may not seem important to the plot and doesn’t make a whole lot of sense in TFA canon, but I don’t care and it means a lot to me, dang it!


End file.
